The NRA and its allies in talk radio put on a rally in Albany, NY, today.
They turned out somewhere between 1,000 and 2,000 in West Capitol Park, the largest right-wing rally around here since the first tea party Tax Day rally in 2009.
The crowd was overwhelmingly white (99 percent or so), about 90 percent male, and the median age was middle, some old and young, mostly in the 30-50 range.
The major impetus for this rally was Gov. Andrew Cuomo's successful enactment of the SAFE (Secure Ammunition and Firearms Enforcement) Act, which increases regulation of military-style rifles, gun magazines, casual sales of guns, gun access by the mentally ill, etc., earlier this week.
The rally was emceed by Melody Burns, an afternoon talk show host on WGDJ-AM who lies about guns while decrying Democratic "lying."
More, below.
First, some pix.
The mostly homemade signs were tea-party typical -- angry threats and Nazi/Commie BS.
We all have seen this one before, at almost every tea party rally back in their heyday. The not-so-implicit threat is that unless the state/federal government do what the far-right wants, they will kill lawmakers.
And they'll use their AK-47s to do it.
At Albany and other tea party rallies, Obama was the Hitler/Stalin totalitarian despot/mass murderer. Now, here, it's Cuomo.
More of that, a pre-printed sign with ominous bullet-holes in the letters of "IMPEACH." BTW, not gonna happen, the SAFE Act passed the Assembly 104-43 and the Senate by 43-18. Plus, a Siena College poll this week found Cuomo with 71 percent approval; support for banning assault weapons and magazine clips of more than seven bullets was even greater -- 73 percent.
Another "patriot" who says he's ready to kill cops. The sign reads, "I am willing to die (in red) to protect my 2nd Amendment rights. Are you willing to die (in red again) trying to take them from me?"
This one is new -- yellow stars that presumably equate American legal gun owners with Jews in Nazi Europe. Wonder what the ADL thinks of that?
This was also new, at Albany RW gatherings anyway -- Alex Jones CT nuts who can only wear their shirts at rallies like this and inside their homes.
New wingnut agitprop, part trois. This woman (from Oklahoma!?) stood just to the right of the speakers. The federal Dick Act has become a staple of the gun-nutosphere, where they propose that a law about militias passed more than a century ago outlaws gun control and is unrepealable. Yeah, right.
This was a rally, with speakers who roused the rabble in various ways. Republican legislators who voted against the bill, a tea party guy who now heads a town GOP committee in Saratoga County, the top local Ron Paul organizer, and veteran RW conspiracist Bob Schulz.
Their shtick was essentially the same old -- tyranny, Constitution, vote for me, get involved with our little group, etc.
I didn't hear all the speakers, only spent an hour there in the middle of the program.
But I did see most of the usual tea party suspects from three-plus years ago -- Tom Chandler on the podium (a several-times-a-day wingnut caller to local talk radio, from his job with the Town of Guilderland), Tom Cavanagh also on the podium, Spyder, Steve Vasquez (the Ron Paul organizer who spoke at every tea party rally, and here too), and Bill Hart, who fantasized about "the next level of what to do, the what ifs of battle" back in 2009.
Those guys were gun nuts and RW Republicans before they jumped on the tea party bandwagon. They, like many on the right, have moved seamlessly (prompted by RW media) from yelling about their freedom to have shitty expensive health insurance to yelling about their freedom to have military-style weapons with large magazines.
There were many other NRA-promoted gun-rights rallies around the country today, which was Gun Appreciation Day.
And the first day of the Martin Luther King holiday weekend.
King was killed by a gun fired by a racist felon.
I'd like to think that this coincidence is just happenstance, though obviously ironic.
But it may well have been intentional.